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Xinhua world news summary at 1530 GMT, June 16

Xinhua, June 16, 2015 Adjust font size:

Nasir al-Wuhayshi, leader of the al-Qaida branch in Yemen and second-in-command in the terror group, was targeted, and possibly killed, in a U.S. drone attack last week, U.S. media reported Monday.

The U.S. government is still poring over intelligence on the June 9 attack, operated by the Central Intelligence Agency, to verify that Wuhayshi was killed in Yemen's Hadramout region, U.S. officials were quoted by The Washington Post as saying. (US-Al-Qaida Leader-Drone Strike)

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MOSCOW -- Russian President Vladimir Putin said Tuesday that the country's armed forces will be equipped with at least 70 percent of modern armament by 2020, an ambitious plan to reinforce Russia's defense capability amid NATO's increasing military build-up near Russian borders.

"The share of modern weaponry should increase to 70 percent by 2020, and in some cases to 100 percent," Putin said at the International Military-Technical Forum "ARMY 2015" in Kubinka air base in the Moscow region. (Russia-Military)

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KIEV -- A team of international experts arrived in eastern Ukraine to start a fresh round of investigations at the crash site of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17, the press office of the Ukrainian Security Service (SBU) said in a statement Tuesday.

"Today, the new mission begins in eastern Ukraine in the framework of the investigation into the MH17 crash," Vasyl Vovk, head of the main Investigative Department at the SBU, was quoted as saying by the press office. (Ukraine-Experts-MH17)

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SEOUL -- Four more cases of infection with the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) were reported in South Korea Tuesday, while three deaths were added among the confirmed cases, the health ministry said.

Four more people were confirmed positive for the deadly viral disease, bringing the total contagion to 154 since the first case was identified on May 20, according to the Ministry of Health and Welfare. (S.Korea-MERS)

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CAIRO -- An Egyptian court on Tuesday confirmed a death sentence against ousted president Mohamed Morsi over mass jailbreak during the 2011 uprising, state-run Nile TV reported.

Another five members of the outlawed Brotherhood, including Mohamed Badie, general guide of the group, were handed the same death verdict. (Egypt-Morsi) Endi